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New Ebola Report Predicts Huge Spike Without Action

Two scenarios, two completely different outcomes. One has as many as 1.4 million Ebola cases by the end of January, while the other has the epidemic under control and almost over by that time, NBC reports.

Actually, the 1.4 million projection is already out of date, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says. It was based on how badly the Ebola epidemic was going in West Africa in August — before the U.S. said it was literally sending in the marines, and before other countries said they were going to do more.

The action that’s already under way is beginning to reverse the worst trends, and a rapid scale-up of help can turn things around, the CDC says.

The CDC’s latest calculations show that at least 8,000 people will have become infected by the end of this month — and maybe as many as 21,000, because it’s clear that most cases are being missed.

That means a lot of deaths — the World Health Organization has revised its death rate estimate to 70 percent of cases, much more than the 50 percent mortality rate now being reported. WHO reports 5,843 people are sick and says 2,803 have died in the epidemic.